And We're All Falling

Find What You're Looking For?

        Conflicting thoughts crowded her mind. Her usually crystal clear mind was a sea of endless confusion. What to say, how to say it, did it happen? It was frustrating, not knowing what to say. Typically, she was the one to come back with a quick and clever remark or speak up in a heated topic to settle hot headed businessmen. A confused mind was a foreign occurance to her.

"You want to know the entire story?" she blurted out, past the point of keeping her secrets behind closed lips.

Wash turned to her from across the aisle.

"Are you comfortable doing that?" he asked, giving her a concerned look. "You seem...not...okay?"

"I'm fine," she assured. "Or, at the very least, I will be by the end of this. Enough keeping secrets. It's time someone knew, right?"

Biting his lip, he hesitated on his answer.

"Yeah," he decided. "I mean, if that's what you think is best, then go for it."

"Just...please don't judge me for what happened. The past is in the past, or at least, I like to think so," she said quickly.

"I won't," he assured. "But promise me later you won't judge me for the same?"

She stopped. 

"What?" she asked.

"Your story," he reminded, changing the subject purposefully. "I'll give away mine later. Fair?"

"Fair," she agreed, leaning back against the worn wood of the barn.

And her mind took her far, far away to a place she never wanted to return to.

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"Delilah, can you tell me what the answer is to number 6?"

        The sound of the teacher's encouraging voice was like music to Delilah's ears. School was her place; she loved it and could hardly get enough of it. She was a freshman in high school, taking classes with the upperclassmen, not neccessarily because she wanted to, but because it was predestined for her to be there. Always at the top, right? But before the young girl could answer, a snicker broke out from the back row.

"Mr. Jackson, I presume you can read Delilah the question, yes?" the teacher said sharply, attention diverted to the troublemaker.

"What was it like for the Patriots in New York during the Revolutionary War?" the sophmore read boredly.

"The Patriots--"

"Hey there Delilah, what's it like in New York city? I could be a thousand miles away right now and if only you were pretty."

Laughter broke out in the classroom and the freshman's cheeks burned red.

"Quiet! Detention, Jones, for a week," the teacher snapped over the laughter.

        Delilah had always hated her name because of the song that went with it. It also didn't help that she was at the top of her class and several of the sophmores were quite jealous of the fact and made it clear that they did not want her around.

        After the history class situation, Delilah got quieter. She requested to be called Della. Sat at the back of the class. Pretended not to know the answer when she was called on even though her test scores showed that she did. Quietly at the top, she waited and waited for her time to come to break free from the judgemental torture she'd been subjected to.

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"Your assignment is a group project, two to three people per group. We have a list of horses from several farms. You need to pick three mares and breed them to one stallion. They cannot be from the same farm. You must figure out the total cost of the breeding. I also expect a detailed prospective foal report in order by likeliness to occur. I will post when it is due soon. Good Luck!"